Katja Gramann was born and raised in Germany and is currently a full-time artist. Painting has long been the one constant in her life; her parents realized her love for it when she was a young girl. At age twelve, they gifted her a set of watercolor paints, and this lifelong pursuit of art began. Gramann worked exclusively in watercolor until she moved to Berlin after college and became acquainted with large-format acrylic painting in the school of artist couple Jürgen Sage and Astrid Albers. Gramann had her first major solo show in 2016; in 2020, the coronavirus pandemic significantly altered her artistic production. To counteract the dreary, lonely reality of the pandemic, Gramann made her already-powerful color palette even more vibrant, a trajectory still visible in her work today.

Gramann’s art has three main directions. The first is acrylic abstraction in the large format she learned in Berlin. The second is her use of structural materials like ash, sand, coffee grounds, and other unusual textural elements on wood. The third is that of abstract collage from fine Chinese paper. Most recently, Gramann has completed a series of ink and resin paintings. The process involves dying Chinese paper with generously applied, richly pigmented inks. Once the paint dries, Gramann collages the individual scraps on a robust wooden support. Finally, resin is poured on the paper lending a glossy, luminous feel to the piece. Gramann’s diverse body of work reflects her ability to seamlessly move from medium to medium, as well as her long career as an artist. Yet, despite this long career, much of Gramann’s work emerges through trial and error, as she constantly aims to innovate within her skillset as an artist. Ultimately, art is where Gramann finds comfort. She has been able to adapt her art to different periods in her life, shaping it in new ways with each passing year.